The Vatican Information Service is a news service, founded in the Holy See Press Office, that provides information about the Magisterium and the pastoral activities of the Holy Father and the Roman Curia...[+]

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Thursday, March 27, 2014

Vatican City, 27 March 2014 (VIS) –
This morning Barack H. Obama, president of the United States of
America, was received in audience by Pope Francis, after which he met
with Cardinal Secretary of State Pietro Parolin and Archbishop
Dominique Mamberti, secretary for Relations with States.

During the cordial meeting, views were
exchanged on some current international themes and hope was expressed
that, in areas of conflict, there would be respect for humanitarian
and international law and a negotiated solution between the parties
involved.

In the context of bilateral relations
and cooperation between Church and State, the Parties discussed
questions of particular relevance for the Church, such as the
exercise of the rights to religious freedom, life and conscientious
objection, as well as the issue of immigration reform. Finally, the
Parties stated their common commitment to the eradication of human
trafficking throughout the world.

Vatican City, 27 March 2014 (VIS) –
The dialogue between God's lament and man's justifications was the
theme selected by the Holy Father in the homily he pronounced at this
morning's Mass in St. Peter's Basilica, attended by Italian ministers
and members of parliament. Pope Francis spoke about the infidelity of
the People of God, a generation that does not accept His messages,
and in their place, seek justifications for their sins. “It was a
very great task to drive idolatry from the hearts of his people, to
make them docile to His Word. But they followed this route for a
little while, before turning back”.

“From being sinners, they went on to
become corrupt”, he continued. “It is very hard for a corrupt
person to turn back. The sinner, yes, because the Lord is merciful
and awaits us all. But the corrupt are fixed on their affairs, and
these people were corrupt. They therefore sought to justify
themselves, because Jesus, with his simplicity, but with his strength
in God, made trouble for them. And, step by step, they ended up
convincing themselves that they had to kill Jesus, and one of them
said, 'It is better for a man to die for the people'”.

“These people had taken the wrong
path. They resisted the salvation of the Lord's love, and drifted
from faith, from a theology of faith to a theology of duty: 'You must
do this, this and this …'”. Describing them as hypocrites, Jesus
said, “'They tie up heavy, cumbersome loads and put them on other
people’s shoulders, but they themselves are not willing to lift a
finger to move them'. They rejected the Lord's love and this
rejection set them on a path that was not the dialectic of freedom
offered by the Lord, but that of the logic of necessity, where there
is no room for the Lord. … They have become 'behavioural': men of
good manners, but with bad habits. Jesus called them 'whitewashed
sepulchres'. This is the Lord's pain, God's pain, God's lament”.

Pope Francis mentioned that during Lent
“we would do well to think about the invitation from the Lord to
love, and to ask ourselves, all of us: am I on this path? Or do I
risk justifying myself and taking another path? A road with many
junctions that does not, however, lead to any promise. … And we
pray that the Lord gives us the grace to always follow the path of
salvation, to open ourselves to the salvation that comes only from
God, through faith, not that which is proposed to us by these
'professionals of duty' who had lost the faith and who led their
people with this pastoral theology of duty”.

Vatican City, 27 March 2014 (VIS) –
Today the programme of the Holy Father's pilgrimage to the Holy Land
was published. The trip, which will take place from 24 to 26 May,
will commemorate the 50th anniversary of the meeting between Pope
Paul VI and the Patriarch Athenagoras in Jerusalem.

The Pope will depart from Rome's
Fiumicino airport at 8.15 a.m. and is schedule to arrive in Amman,
Jordan at 1.15 p.m. Following the welcome ceremony at Queen Alia
International Airport, he will proceed to the al-Husseini Royal
Palace in Amman, where he will be received by King Abdullah II and
Queen Rania, and will speak before the authorities of the kingdom of
Jordan. At 4.00 p.m. Mass will be celebrated at the International
Stadium in Amman, and later in the same afternoon he will meet with
refugees and young disabled people in the Latin Church.

On Sunday, 25 May, the Pope will leave
Jordan by helicopter at 8.15 a.m., destined for Bethlehem. In the
presidential palace, after a courtesy visit to the president of the
State of Palestine, Mahmoud Abbas, he will address the Palestinian
authorities. At 11 a.m. he will celebrate Mass and pray the Angelus
in Manger Square in Bethlehem. The Holy Father will lunch with a
number of Palestinian families in the Franciscan convent of Casa Nova
and at 3 p.m. he will make a private visit to the Grotto of the
Nativity. He will then greet the children in the refugee camps of
Deheisheh, Aida and Beit Jibrin and, at 3.45 p.m., will leave the
State of Palestine to travel by helicopter to the Ben Gurion
International Airport in Tel Aviv, Israel, where his arrival is
scheduled for 4.30 p.m. Following the welcome ceremony he will
proceed, again by helicopter, to Jerusalem, where at 6.15 p.m. he
will meet privately with the Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew I of
Constantinople at the apostolic delegation in Jerusalem, for the
signing of a joint declaration. At 7 p.m. in the Basilica of the Holy
Sepulchre an ecumenical meeting will take place, to commemorate the
50th anniversary of the meeting in Jerusalem between Pope Paul VI and
Patriarch Athenagoras, after which Pope Francis will dine with the
patriarchs, bishops and the papal suite at the Latin Patriarchate in
Jerusalem.

On Monday, 26 May at 8.15 a.m. the Holy
Father will visit the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem in the building of the
Great Council on the Esplanade of the Mosques, and will give an
address. He will subsequently visit the Western Wall, after which he
will lay a wreath at Mount Herzl. At 10 a.m. he will visit the Yad
Vashem Memorial in Jerusalem, where he will speak, and at 10.45., he
will make a courtesy visit to the two Chief Rabbis at the Heichal
Shlomo Centre, next to the Great Synagogue of Jerusalem. At 11.45 he
will proceed to the presidential palace where he will be received by
the president of the State of Israel, Simon Peres. At 1 p.m., in the
Notre Dame Centre, he will hold a private audience with the prime
minister of Israel, Benjamin Netanyahu. At 3.30 p.m. he will meet
privately with the Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople,
Bartholomew 1, near the Viri Galileai Orthodox Church on the Mount of
Olives. At 4 p.m., in the Church of Gethsemane at the foot of the
Mount of Olives, he will address priests, men and women religious and
seminarians. At 5.20 p.m. he will celebrate Mass with the Ordinaries
of the Holy Land and the Papal suite in the room of the Cenacle in
Jerusalem. At 7.30 p.m. he will transfer by helicopter from the Mount
Scopus heliport to Ben Gurion International Airport in Tel Aviv,
where he will bid farewell to the State of Israel. The papal
aeroplane will depart at 8.15 p.m. for Rome's Ciampino airport, where
it is scheduled to land at approximately 11 p.m.

Vatican City, 27 March 2014 (VIS) –
On Tuesday, 1 April, in Vatican Radio's Sala Marconi, there will be a
presentation of “The Voice of the Popes”, Vatican Radio's digital
archive which brings together the voices of the popes who have
succeeded to the see of St. Peter since 1931, the year in which the
pontifical broadcasting entity was founded, from Pius XI to Francis.
The institutional tasks of Vatican Radio are to consult, preserve and
manage the papal audio archive ensuring that, in the case of use by
third parties, the pastoral character of the material is conserved
and intellectual property rights are protected.

The digitisation of the archive, which
will take place in conjunction with the canonisation of Popes John
XXIII and John Paul II on 27 April, will guarantee the conservation
of the audio material, whose integrity may be endangered by wear and
tear of archive supports, and will allow the archiving of audio
material and text (metadata) in a far more efficient and rational
way. The new digital support will also ensure easier use of content
by information workers and scholars.

“The Vatican Radio technical
directorate has completed the digitisation of the pontifical audio
archive, reproducing the content of the 8000 tapes and original
supports documenting the activities of popes, from Pius XI up to
Francis, including Popes John XXIII and John Paul II, who will soon
be canonised”.

Speakers at the press conference for
the presentation of “The Voices of the Popes”, moderated by Fr.
Federico Lombardi S.J., director general of Vatican Radio, were:
Cardinal Giovan Battista Re, prefect emeritus of the Congregation for
Bishops and president emeritus of the Pontifical Commission for Latin
America, Vatican specialist Gian Franco Svidercoschi, and Guido
Gusso, Pope John XXIII's valet and Dean of the Hall of the Papal
Antechamber under Pope John Paul II. The digitisation of the archive
was undertaken with the contribution of the Banca Intesa Russia and
with the support of Confartigianato Persone.